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Thailand’s Charms |
Shopping for amulets,
talismans, and a miracle... |
| During my visit to Thailand, I kept peeking
down men’s necklines. In the deeply Buddhist country, amulets
are worn for their power to bring financial success, enhance fertility,
and all around protection. Specific charms even exist protecting crooks
from cops and cops from bullets. If you understand the symbol a person
is wearing, you just might get a glimpse into his soul. |
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Signs of the culture’s spiritual identity are hard to miss
with the omnipresence of spirit houses, mini-shrines, even altars
hanging from the rear-view mirrors of cars. The more dented the vehicle,
the more lavish the altar. This is a culture that has faith.
Having faith and living righteously all pay off in the next life,
when the virtuous one gets reincarnated in a higher form, one step
closer to Nirvana. To keep in touch with the spiritual world, folks
have taken to wearing sacred symbols, literally close to the heart.
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Spirituality as an Industry
The amulet market I visited was a strip of sidewalk by the temple
complex, Wat Mahathat. I was planning on souvenir shopping because
after all, who doesn’t need a little help in the areas of
health, wealth, and general success?
One stand had back issues of amulet magazines for collectors keeping
up with the industry. A few issues were opened to bloody photos
of accidents next to close ups of the amulet responsible for the
miraculous survival. I quickly realized that my lack of Thai language
skills and relative ignorance meant I was out of my league. Unless
I wanted to walk home with a bunch of overpriced fakes and made
up miracle stories, I was better off leaving the spiritual shopping
to the professionals.
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Most of the browsing was at the stands of freelance dealers with
their offerings spread out, picnic blanket style. On the shopfront
side of the street were passageways made up of permanent stalls with
locked glass counters and certificates of authenticity. Collecters
peered through microscopes at the tainted, dusty surfaces of trinkets
for… well, here’s what they might be looking for... |
First of all, an authentic amulet must be made of the
right material, the most traditional being bronze, clay, plaster,
or gold. (Plastic is considered incapable of transmitting spirituality.)
For an extra dose of power, ashes from holy texts are mixed into the
formula.
Secondly, a monk needs to activate the amulet with spells. Pieces
blessed by a true guru monk with a history of putting out miraculous
charms are worth more than the output of a young, unproven monk.
But what really gives an amulet value is a history of miracles and
other protective feats. On that matter, Thailand-based writer, Philip
Cornwell-Smith pointed out an irony: the lucky survivor profiled in
an amulet magazine would be reported in the daily papers as simply
a victim of terrible injuries. It’s all a matter of perspective.
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What would Buddha think?
The use of charms flourished during a period in Thailand when warfare
and mass migrations were a constant threat. Mass produced images
of the Buddha in portable form helped keep his teachings from dying
out. Unfortunately, the trend today sees amulets losing touch with
the teachings of Dharma and gaining an “all-in-one”
magic charm status.
More optimistic Buddhist teachers see it this way: amulets could
serve as crutches for the spiritually underdeveloped. After all,
if wearing an amulet helps you remember to behave virtuously, who’s
to say that good things wouldn’t happen? (Certainly not the
laws of karma.) Why not use an amulet to get into the righteous
frame of mind until that frame of mind becomes natural?
Deciding to go with the “amulets as a spiritual crutch”
approach, I bought a handful of assorted deities at 3 bhat a piece.
Picking them out of a pile of new, yet identically worn down pieces,
I couldn’t tell if they were of plastic or clay. |
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In the days that followed, I stopped looking down the shirts
of men and started asking about their charms directly. What might
amulets mean to people on a personal level, away from the hard sell
of the market dealers?
The bellhop at the hotel was shy about pulling his out. His pendant
was a symbol and of a material from his mother’s village.
He said he wore it for a sense of security.
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The owner of a foreign bookstore willingly
showed me his but waved aside my questions of magic spells and religious
significance. “I don’t wear this image because it has
a meaning. I wear it for me. I wear it for my mind.” He tapped
his temples and waved his hands in the air above his head. Though
he downplayed the significance of holy symbolism, his gesture suggested
that a connection between him and a greater power somehow exists
after all.
[originally published in Weekender
Magazine/ Jan. 02-15, 2007] |
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